Dealing with Sanity (Bouts of Madness) in Combat - how do you handle it without making the players useless?

[Keeper Bolog]

Greetings!

I return with yet more stupid questions, sorry for this I am fairly new to the CoC 7e hobby ^^

Now the question:

How do you deal with Sanity rolls , specifically FAILED sanity rolls that leads to a bout of madness while in combat?

For example if out of 4 player characters only 1 of them succeeds their sanity check and goes into a bout of madness that player is practically useless during the entire fight, especially if a "run away" or "feeling relaxed" bout of madness gets picked. How do you make that player feel engaged during the combat? And do your goons atack him if he just stands around drooling insane or doing random things instead of defending himself?

Advice appreciated!

Thanks a lot!

Edited December 14, 2023 by Keeper Bolog

[Runeblogger]

That's a good question! 

A good way would be for some NPCs to accompany the PCs. Then, if some PC suffers a bout of madness that lasts for many turns, the player can temporarily control one of the NPCs and so remain in the action while her PC is running away or incapacitated.

[KarlF]

This can be tough to manage, especially if you only have a small group. TBH I often take the Bout of Madness roll with a grain of salt and - if I feel it does not help the story/session then I change the effect to suit. Also if the character has failed their INT check then they have "repressed the memory" which can be even more awkward as they are now in a situation that they don't believe is even happening! If you feel that your players are up to it you can possibly bring them on-board to roleplay their insanity and keep them active.

In one of my scenarios an investigator lost a lot of Sanity points as a result of seeing something very unpleasant and IIRC the bout of madness roll was "physical hysterics/emotional outburst". At this point there was only one other investigator involved and rather than just slaughter them both - which could have happened but would have brought the scenario to an abrupt and very premature end - I engaged with the player by describing how they saw instead their father who they hated. They stayed involved in the combat by "arguing" with their father - i.e. an emotional outburst - including dodging blows when he made to strike them and eventually becoming so angry that they struck back i.e. the 1d10 rounds were up.

[EricW]

I think you can have a lot of fun with madness. 

For example, if a player becomes paranoid, why tell them? Much more fun to take the player aside, and tell them they just noticed something suspicious about one of their fellow PCs, like a glint of green in their blood, or some other indication they are not what they seem to be.

If done right, the paranoid PC themself might start denouncing their fellow PCs, leading to all sorts of fun. That way they still get to play as a PC, but their perceptions and senses are distorted by their madness, so they are interpreting things differently to their fellows.

If they recover sanity, you could point out they suddenly realise blood is supposed to be green / blue sometimes - veinous blood.